Mission teams, donors, and strategic partners enabled sponsored children to gain new skills this summer at Camp Hope. Non-profit partners Care of Creation and Hope Seeds provided training and seeds for our campers to learn how to construct sack gardens for sustainable gardening and agricultural training.
Brittany Ederer, one of Care of Creation’s Outreach Specialists, taught classes at Camp Hope with the assistance of translator Oxy Vanosky and trained our mentors to build sack gardens with the campers. Brittany remarked, “Our relationship with creation includes the food we eat, which connects us to the plants, soil, water, and nutrient cycles around us. We discussed the importance of protecting the soil from erosion as central to tending and keeping a garden, as well as giving back to the soil by creating compost. In our activity time we built eight sack gardens together. A well-cared for garden will produce abundantly, and over time, the healing of the soil will lead to a healthier ecosystem.”
The sack gardens are made with large gunny sacks filled with rocks in the center core for stability. Quality fill dirt is placed along the sides and top of the sacks where seeds are then planted, mulched with plant material, and watered. At the end of camp, all teens were given a sack and some seed to recreate the garden outside their homes.
The long-term goal is to provide curriculum and resources in Haitian Creole to train and assist our Haitian leaders and staff who will work with our children to build gardens, grow healthy food, and tend to God’s creation.